[…] the formation of the Pierrot Players was already a living impulse as early as 1964. As the four principals talked further in the following summer at Wardour Castle and then later on when back in London, it gradually took on form and shape, until it finally became a reality in 1967.

(Seabrook, Mike (1994), Max: The Life and Music of Peter Maxwell Davies (London: Victor Gollancz), 101.)